DRUM Collection: History Theses and Dissertationshttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2778
Tue, 03 Mar 2015 22:37:13 GMT2015-03-03T22:37:13ZSeparation and Loss: Sequential Traumatization and the Loss of Family Life Experienced among the Children of the Kindertransportshttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/16246
Title: Separation and Loss: Sequential Traumatization and the Loss of Family Life Experienced among the Children of the Kindertransports
Authors: Stahl, Matthew Christian
Abstract: Between December 1938 and September 1939, 10,000 Jewish children were evacuated from Nazi territory to the United Kingdom. Approximately ninety percent of these children were never reunited with their families. This thesis draws upon oral histories and memoirs of children from the Kindertransports in order to understand and analyze the traumas they experienced before fleeing from Nazi persecution and as a result of their separation from their parents as well as the factors that most influenced the long-term effects of this trauma.Wed, 01 Jan 2014 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/162462014-01-01T00:00:00ZZoned Desires: Prostitution, Family Politics, and Sexual Ideology in 20th Century Iranhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/16215
Title: Zoned Desires: Prostitution, Family Politics, and Sexual Ideology in 20th Century Iran
Authors: Hosseini, Fatemeh
Abstract: This dissertation explores the regulation and representation of prostitution in Iran during the twentieth century, and concerns itself with dominant sexual ideologies during this period. While Tehran's red-light district, Shahr-i Nau, is largely absent from modern Iranian historiography, I argue for the significance of this contested urban space to the understanding of Iranian history and society. Using citizen petition letters, police records, and government memos, I highlight the gradual shift in Pahlavi policy from policies focused on the informal removal or relocation of prostitutes to one focused on systematic regulation, epidemiological surveillance, and the geographic concentration of prostitution.
The dissertation also frames the social attitudes towards and the multiple meanings assigned to prostitution and examines efforts to control the meaning and image of prostitution. Using women's magazines and scientific studies, I demonstrate how female reformers considered prostitution a result of outdated modes of family practices. The discourse surrounding the links between family and prostitution, then, contributed to an elite form of women's rights activism in Iran that perpetuated paternalistic frameworks within society. The entertainment industry also concerned itself with prostitution, and a growing number of Iranian movies began representing prostitution. Visibility and space were integral to the understanding of sexuality.
For women engaged in the commercial sex industry the consequences of regulation were mixed and often contradictory. Female prostitutes lived in a perpetual state of vulnerability that stemmed from inequalities in the law and social double-standards. Despite this, they strove for their own interests in the context of unequal relations of power.
In Iran under the Islamic Republic, the Pahlavi policies adopted to control and maintain sexuality and prostitution have manifested along comparable lines, highlighting cultural continuities that remain intact in the face of substantial political change. I argue that despite the momentous political and social changes that have affected Iran in the twentieth century, a study of prostitution and temporary marriage suggests that sexual attitudes remained similar. In post-Revolutionary Iran, temporary marriage was advertised as the solution to society's sexual concerns. In both cases, deviant sexuality was accepted so long as it was separate and invisible.Wed, 01 Jan 2014 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/162152014-01-01T00:00:00Z"An Uncertain Life in Another World": German and Austrian Jewish Refugee Life in Shanghai, 1938-1950http://hdl.handle.net/1903/15877
Title: "An Uncertain Life in Another World": German and Austrian Jewish Refugee Life in Shanghai, 1938-1950
Authors: Hyman, Elizabeth Rebecca
Abstract: Between 1938 and 1941, 20,000 Eastern and Central European Jews fled to Shanghai. Through a close examination or memoirs and oral histories, I argue that the manner in which the refugees experiences the approximately twelve years (1938-1950) they spent in Shanghai was informed by their nationality, gender, and age. Further, I argue that the twelve years they spent in Shanghai eroded the refugee's behavioral, material, and emotional connections to their old lives in Germany and Austria until all they had left was language and memories.Wed, 01 Jan 2014 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/158772014-01-01T00:00:00Z"They Reach an Audience We Do Not:" Labor-Environmental Coalition Building in the United States, 1970-1985http://hdl.handle.net/1903/15791
Title: "They Reach an Audience We Do Not:" Labor-Environmental Coalition Building in the United States, 1970-1985
Authors: Gibson, Paul Edward
Abstract: This dissertation examines the relationship between organized labor and the mainstream environmental movement in the United States between 1970 and 1985. It explores this relationship through the critical lenses of three issues (economic development, energy, and occupational safety and health), which were central to nearly all interactions between organized labor and environmental organizations in this period. I argue that, contrary to popular belief, the two movements collaborated with one another consistently throughout this period. Their cooperative activity, sustained through considerable effort, was partially responsible for building and maintaining the nation's environmental regulatory framework at the close of the twentieth century.Wed, 01 Jan 2014 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/157912014-01-01T00:00:00Z